Official Luthiers Forum!

OK let's do a little mini study right here on the OLF.

I'll tell a joke I think is really funny and see how many agree or just give a blank stare.

Two guys are talking and one says he just got back from Mercy Australia.

The other guy asks if he had the famous local tea made with Koala Bear hide.

"Oh man did I" he answers. "Terrible stuff, all full of hair and pieces of skin."

"Makes sense" his friend remarks- "The Koala tea of Mercy is not strained"

_________________
It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

Took me a minute, but got it. Good one.

_________________
Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

That joke was pretty Bard. . .

_________________
Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

I am the Bard!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

_________________
Insta - https://www.instagram.com/cbcguitars/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/cbcguitars

Check your spelling, Brad.

_________________
The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Maybe Brad/Bard is like Brian/Brain....

_________________
Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

Hahaha...

Way too often someone will send me an email at working calling me “Bard”. They always get that in reply.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

_________________
Insta - https://www.instagram.com/cbcguitars/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/cbcguitars

I've made the decision to do this whole batch with peghead access. One of the main reasons that I want to access the truss rod at the peghead is for ease of setup/maintenance. I don't think any of my clients would try to fool with it themselves. I just hate messing with it through the sound hole and two of the guitars in this batch are for me anyway.

I'm assuming that this is one of the fundamental differences between the specs in Taylor (peghead) and Martin (soundhole), martin being significantly thinner at the first fret position across all of their models. At this point my main concern is getting too thin at the nut for truss rod access. I always thought I liked a thinner neck, but Taylor has always been my favorite factory neck by far. It might have more to do with the matte texture of the finish, which is how I finish mine as well. These builds are also 27.5" on the long end of fan frets so I don't want to go too thin and end up with a problem due to the additional tension created by the longer scale.

For you peghead truss rod guys, is there a particular truss rod you prefer over the other, maybe a lower profile at the nut specifically designed for peghead access? I have one of Allied's 15" Flex Strong truss rods and it is really nice but pricey and I need 6 of them. Stew Mac's low profile truss rods have awful reviews- they ARE just 10 bucks.

(Edited for my Trazadone induced incoherent grammar + refusal to go to sleep in order to get this post out instead) Insomnia sucks! I swear...I'm not illiterate!

I think the Martin truss rods are the best thing going. I think Stew Mac makes a copy of those now, is that what you are talking about when you say low profile? I think the Martin's are about ten bucks too but I have not bought any in a while. The one pictured above is the SM Hot Rod. I thought they were descent enough even though from what I understand they had some complaints with them. I never had a problem. But that was my last one and I won't buy another one again because the Martin's are just better.

I just picked up some of the "new" StewMac low profile rods. It looks like they discontinued the regular Martin style low profile rods and rebranded them as hot rot low profile complete with red wrapping instead of the old black. They look very similar to the rods I got from martin guitar maker's connection (other than the color).

_________________
Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

Saving money on truss rods sounds like a good idea until you have your first failure and have to pull the fretboard to replace the rod. I've done that ... once. I don't plan on doing it again (on one of mine anyway). I'm another team soundhole guy and use Martin 2-way rods because I think they're one of the strongest truss rods around. Martin doesn't like warranty work and neither do I.

_________________
Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Another good thing about those Martin rods, if you do sound hole access, you can pull them right out. So if one of them ever broke on one of my guitars all I would have to do is unbolt and remove then neck, pull it out and slip a new one in.

A lot of the bad reviews on the hot rod low profile rod seem to be associated with the installation tool and fit. When I used the similar Martin rod, I too used soundhole access and a bolt on neck. I don’t try to fit the barrel part into a round hole so I don’t use any intallation tool beyond the plough plane I use to make the groove and a chisel to widen the heel end of the channel to make room for the nut end. Like John, I could pull the rod out after the neck is off. I plan to do the same thing when I get around to using the StewMac rods.

_________________
Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

We have an order in for the new StewMac rods to determine just how much they vary from the earlier Chinese knock-offs of the Martin rods that we consider unsatisfactory, but judging from appearances, the design appears to be very similar, with much less in the way of weld strength in the adjuster section on the knock-offs and the smaller 4mm socket versus the 5mm on the Martin.

As for use of the Martin or the knock-off rods in a neck-adjusted design, a 15 degree peghead angle would push the beginning of the operating portion of the rod to about the mid-point of the nut-to-first fret gap if using a flat-mounted nut, and a nut's width closer to the first fret for an angled nut. The Martin rod would have to have a bit of grinding done to taper the upper bar (it extends the full length of the rod, versus the shortened top bar on the knock-offs), but there is so much beef there that it is certainly doable.

Martin runs $13 for their rod, versus $10.90 for the knock-offs. Give that Martin has more than a million 2-way rods in service and we have not heard of a single failure, it seems worth the $2.10 premium to get the proven reliability of the actual Martin item.

_________________
For the times they are a changin'

- Bob Dylan